The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1887-02-05
nIONKSIEX HALL IS

Sixty years ago Alfred Tennyson wrote
the poem which bears the title of
"Locksley Hail." and which is considered
by many eminent critics to be his greatest
work. Certain it is that in no other has
he SO moved the worlds sympathy, for
the song which issued from the poets
lips had it's source in the mans heart. 1t
has been said, and he who reads "Locksley
HalP' will never doubt its truth, that the
story therein told was the heart history
of Alfred Tennyson; that Amy forseok
his love to be the wife of fox-hunting
and prosperous clergyman, and it was her
weak perfdy which in his rage and grief
he embalmed in the pyramid Of his own
fame. The passionate strain of insulted
and rejected love swells into peal of
beautiful hope, lofty purpose, and return
ing love and faith in humanity, and its
echo shook the listening world. Three
score years have frosted the head and
chilled the heart of the forsaken lover
and passionate poet, and the now aged
peer and laureate tunes again his harp
for second "Locksley Hail." the text
this time being grandson's wrongs. 1t
is easy to be philosophical over another's
woes, and philosophy and poetry have
little in common.
OF see thee old and formal, fitted to thy petty
part,
q Of inns I'M
a daughters heart,
sang the scornful, youthful poet; but to-
day unfaithful mistress and hated rival
both are dead, the aged poet alone is
"old and formal" and his trembling scorn
is turned against the youthful passion of
his grandson, and the onward sweep OF
the grandson's age Palsied in limb and
cracked of voice, the world has lost the
rose color of youth and hope, and he sees
only the excuses which follow progress
as the shadow the sun. The measure
halts with the weakness of years, and the
querulous words are those of conservative
age. They are the complaints Of Tenny-
son, the peer, but where is Tennyson,
our poet? for the poet is ever young.
What have the muses. to do with wisdom
and age? There are stanzas in the later
work which seem to rise almost to the old
mark, but they are those which belong to
the eloquepce of retrospection and the
pathos of life whose beauty and
strength lie in the past. The words:
Gone the fires of youth, the follies, furies,
curses, passionate tears;
Gone like fires, and floods, and earthquakes of
the planets dawning years.
Fires that shook me once, but now to silent
ashes fallen away,
Cold upon the dead volcano sleeps the CLEAN
of dying day,
fall upon the heart like the sods upon the
clay that once held spirit dear to our
hearts.
Poor old voice of eighty crying after voices
that have fed.
All loved are vanished voices; all my steps
are on the dead.
And yet the aged warrior tits no feeble
ldHSO dRdlu 0u6Qy OIL I'LL
things old-be they good or ill-progress,
and prophesies chaos as its ultimate goal.
Bring the old. dark ages back without the
faith, without the hope
Break the state, the church, the throne, and
roll their ruins down the slope.
His cry of forward" which rang trium-
plant above the tempest in his youthful
soul, is changed.
Gone the cry of forward, forward, lost within
growing gloom,
Lost or only heard in silence from the silence
of tomb
Forward rang the voices then, and, of the
many, mine was one;
Let us hush this cry of forward till ten thous-
and years have gone.
1t is the song of one wearied in the battle
of life and despairing of the victory. The
world will listen sympathetically and re-
spectfully, but it will not believe and it
will not "halt."-The Current.